I’m a big fan of SEO web publishing and have developed over 30 sites that drive pure margin to my bottom line. It’s refreshing as a pay per click professional to have SEO margins of nearly 100 percent in my personal portfolio of websites. I’m also a big fan of the eBay Partner Network. I’ve been in eBay’s affiliate program back since the days it was on Commission Junction and it’s always played an important part in my affiliate marketing strategy (although less so over time). Today, I wanted to take a moment to share my September earnings on the eBay Partner Network and in particular the very volatile nature of eBay’s affiliate program.
eBay Quality Click Pricing: Then and Now
Back in November, 2009 I wrote about eBay’s brand new quality click pricing. It has been almost a year now since eBay migrated from its old model of paying affiliates based on sales and leads to paying for each and every click.
Early on, I was a fan of eBay’s new model because my earnings skyrocketed and became much more consistent. While I’m still a fan of eBay, I have changed my opinion on quality click pricing. I like the old model better. Why? My earnings have trended down sharply in recent months and volatility has skyrocketed.
In addition to trending down, my earnings have been very volatile as of late. Case in point: The snapshot at the end of this article is from my eBay partner account. While my clicks are somewhat consistent, the chart shows my earnings per day coming in at only a few bucks per day and they skyrocketing at the end of the month.
I Have Been Diversifying My SEO Affiliate Business
Over time, my Google AdSense earnings have been trending up like crazy! They have been doing especially well since Google’s new leaderboard format. I have been doing well on Comission Junction as well. In August, I had a record month on Commission Junction with nearly $1,000 in pure SEO earnings. Excitingly, I exceeded my August earnings in September. I’m also not doing too bad on ClickBank these days. I’m now trying to make Amazon Associates work, but I have a long way to go.
In addition to diversifying my affiliate earnings by program, I have also been diversifying my portfolio of domain names. I’m proud to announce that I launched five new sites in September and am on track to do the same in October.
All of this diversification is really important in terms of risk mitigation and sustainability. It’s because of diversification that my decline in eBay earnings and volatility really doesn’t impact me. The two takeaways that I wanted to leave you with:
- eBay’s partner network is great, but be prepared for some volatility.
- Whether you’re managing corporate SEM campaigns, your affiliate marketing business, or your investment portfolio, diversification is key. The graph below is first hand proof that volatility exists even in a program that’s designed to pay you per click, in a relatively consistent fashion.
That is crazy Ian. I am actually working on a few smaller sites that are partially monetized with EPN as well. My earnings are VERY small.
Maybe I should stick with AdSense and/or Clickbank instead?
The EPN network hasn’t been good with me either these past few months… I’ve actually made more with Amazon Associates than EPN but the holidays are coming up so I’m sure the trends of the crazy shopping will catch up and make us all some more money!!
Anyways interesting stats you got too and why do you think it shot up at the end like that??
Thanks for sharing the stats, Ian – posts like this are my favorite. I haven’t implemented EPN yet on any of my sites (I have an account though – I guess I’m just lazy?). Perhaps this will motivate me to actually try it out and see if it’ll add a few bucks to my bottom line.
Similar to what Jeremy and Dino have commented, I’ve heard earnings tend to be small unless you have a lot of exposure in the right niches.
I hope you’ll keep updating us on your stats in the future!
Profit Addiction,
Thanks so much for the comment! Man, you are fast! In a situation of limited space, I’d recommend focusing on AdSense and Commission Junction (with a little CB thrown in). If you still have some real estate left, I’d definitely experiment with EPN as well. I do think my sample set is relatively small so I’m hoping that EPN will be less volatile for you.
All the best,
Ian
Dino,
Thanks so much for the comment, I very much appreciate it. It’s really good to hear that I’m not the only one seeing a decline in my earnings from EPN. That’s really great to hear about your success on Amazon Associates. I’m still working hard and have a long way to go on Amazon. You bring up a great point regarding the holiday season.
In terms of the spike at the end of the month, I really have no clue. I’m thinking that EPN is doing a poor job of smoothing earnings over time. I bet they underpaid me so long that my leads and sales really started adding up and then they had to raise my earnings per click to compensate. It is a crazy chart for sure!
All the best,
Ian
Eric,
Thanks so much for the comment! I really appreciate the positive feedback. It’s great to see three comments just minutes after posting this. 🙂 I think I’m on the right track with these posts with stats! I definitely encourage you to try EPN and would be curious to see how it goes for you. How’s your dot me site going? I just launched my 5th dot me site this last weekend!
All the best,
Ian
Ian – It’s actually going great. I’m already ranked #12 in Google for my primary keyword (which doesn’t have super high competition, but does receive 12,100 searches per month). I’m liking dot me domains so far, and recently snatched up another last week.
I would love to try EPN, but they don’t accept my country and I really hate it.
Ian hit me up via email and I can give you some tips on your Amazon earnings.
I’ve been meaning to talk to you anyway actually – I had a few other things I wanted to run by you as well.
(I’m mobile now otherwise I’d just send the email now)
Eric,
That is awesome news! I’m very happy to hear you are having success with your dot me domain and are buying more. I’m a big fan. I have picked up a few domains that would literally cost $1,000,000 for the dot com version! It’s great to hear good things about dot me.
Best,
Ian
Alex,
Thanks so much for the comment, much appreciated as always. That’s too bad to hear you are not able to join EPN.
Best,
Ian
Chris,
Thanks for the comment! I will definitely shoot you an email. It would be great to get some Amazon tips from the man who makes a living on Amazon Associates! I am also happy to help out and answer any questions you may have.
All the best,
Ian
Hey Ian, congrats on your higher earning month with CJ, by the way are you running blogs for your niche sites? In regards to your SEO efforts would be really happy if you ran Keyword Winner on your posts, perhaps do a case study on this?!
Dan,
Thanks so much for the kind words and comment! 🙂 I have heard a lot of great things about Keyword Winner and it sounds very exciting. I’d be delighted to test it out, and it’s definitely on my to do list. Congrats on all the success with Keyword Winner!
All the best,
Ian